


Holding On

by Gildedmuse



Category: Rent (2005), Rent - Larson
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Gift Fic, Grief/Mourning, HIV/AIDS, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, One Shot, Post-Canon, Referenced Mark/Maureen, Referenced Roger/Mimi, sex without love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-05-06
Packaged: 2020-02-27 00:36:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18728107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gildedmuse/pseuds/Gildedmuse
Summary: After Mimi's funereal, Mark and Roger need to make sure they're okay.





	Holding On

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Piper47](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Piper47/gifts).



> [Originally written in 2006 as a gift for piper47 on LJ]

**Holding On**

  
Hands glide over his stomach, tracing the dips muscles or where the muscles should be, brushing along skin stretched over bone. Hardly the picture of physical perfection. Hardly poster worthy anymore.  
  
He wonders; who is he with right now? He can’t actually be here, with him, so who is he thinking of as hands slide down his back and lips crease his ear.  
  
Maureen, Roger decides. Mark will always be in love with that girl no matter what she does to him, so it must be Maureen.  
  
Mark thinks it has to be Mimi. He isn’t a small little thing with wild hair and soft curves, but he’s pretty certain that right now, for Roger, he is Mimi. Or maybe that wound is too fresh. Maybe he’s playing the part of April. Either way, he is anyone but the scrawny, pale, goofy roommate. That’s just not who Roger needs right now, and Mark is determined to be who he needs.  
  
It doesn’t really matter to either boy. What’s important is that the other one is there, touchable, alive. What matters is that neither has run off. That’s what they’re really doing right now. Keeping the other one there with them.  
  
Legs tangle together and hands slide lower. Mouths meet for a desperate sort of kiss where Roger is trying to be a drama queen and Mark is trying to be a beautiful druggie and both just want to make sure that the other doesn’t leave.  
  
At the funeral that day, Mark hadn’t been able to stop himself. He kept thinking, if only I could be filming all of this right now. His fingers would twitch at the thought, aching to hold up the worn, metal body of his camera. It’s embarrassing, how much that old camera is like a teddy bear or the blanket a child needs to hold onto to feel safe.  
  
Mark hates himself for what he’s been thinking. He bites down on Roger’s lip, and beneath him Roger yelps and arches up into the slight pain. A little pain to try and ease Mark’s guilt. It doesn’t work.  
  
It’s horrible, but back there listening to Maureen crying as she went on about Mimi, his mind wouldn’t stop obsessing over shots and film clips and narration. He tried to fight it off and go against every one of his senses that were piercing together a film, but no matter what he did he couldn’t force himself into the present. The worst part is how, honestly, he’s thankful. No one wanted to be there.  
  
Now he’s trying to make it up by not letting his mind wander off. He’s giving in to the present and not thinking about what they’re really doing. Roger’s hand slides down Mark’s stomach, touching him and pulling him back from his slip and thinking about the funeral. That is what friends are for, right? Kissing you hard when your mind starts to obsess over things like death.  
  
After the bite, Mark gets gentle again. He doesn’t want Roger to break apart beneath him. Roger, who could make audiences everywhere feel their hearts clench up and twist for him. He has the sort of rawness that filmmakers live their whole lives wanting, and Mark has it right there in the form of his best friend, looking as though a single touch will break him into a million pieces.  
  
Beneath him Roger pushes up into his hands, proving that he isn’t going to break. Roger wants to prove that he isn’t going to shatter.  
  
It’s really selfish, the way they’re using each other. It isn’t about being close. It isn’t even about friendship and comfort. Mark wants to make sure Roger isn’t running off, and that’s why he crawled into bed with him in the first place, so that Roger couldn’t leave while Mark wasn’t watching. Roger wants to make sure that if he falls apart again, Mark will try and fix him like he did that last time. That’s why Roger kissed him, and it isn’t about loving Mark or anything. It’s about testing to make sure Mark still loves him.  
  
Mark does still love him, and they roll over on the bed, lips moving together, rubbing up against one another to make sure he is still there and that he is not broken. Even when they’re groaning against each other’s mouths and moving together, it still doesn’t feel like sex. How can it be sex between them, when there are too many layers of histories and emotions and things left unsaid between them?   
  
It isn’t sex. Even when Roger says his name and Mark doesn’t have to wonder who he’s thinking of, he refuses to think of it as something they’re doing for pleasure. No, it’s a way to make sure Roger isn’t leaving him. He can’t leave, because he’s thin and so tired and Mark doesn’t know if he’ll have time to make it back if he abandons Mark again.  
  
Even when Roger curls up against Mark, clinging to him almost desperately, he doesn’t think it seems odd for them as just friends because he knows that he’s always needed Mark to hold onto. So it’s nothing new. Even the words, “I love you,” (which he doesn’t really mean to say until they’ve already slipped out) aren’t new. Not that it matters, because it’s always been true.  
  
Mark looks down at Roger, brushing some of those wild brown and blonde curls from his eyes. “Don’t leave, Roger.”  
  
They both know it’s an impossible request, but what they’re doing right now is just as impossible. Best friends don’t fall into bed together after a funeral. Best friends don’t say I love you to each other. Best friends shouldn’t be crossing all these lines, and here they are wrapped in each other’s arms after doing all these things they shouldn’t be doing. So despite how impossible it is, Roger kisses him and says, “I’m staying here.”  
  
Even if Mark knows it’s a lie, he relaxes into Roger’s arms, bodies pressed against each other on the small, worn down bed. When Roger starts to cry again, curling up against Mark as he cries himself into sleep, Mark just keeps holding onto him, reminding himself that Roger promises to stay here. No matter what, he tells himself, you have to hold on.


End file.
